A LIFEBOAT OFF THE ISLAND (Owen’s Story)

There are images you don’t forget when your child is diagnosed with a brain tumor. The look on your wife’s face as a doctor explains to her that, no, your son is not OK and won’t be going home from the hospital. The supernatural glow the tumor has when you look at that first image of his brain. The way a doctor idly twists a phone cord during a family meeting, sighs in a way that is so far from hopeful it doesn’t even feel in the same state as despair, and says, “So Second opinions…”
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Making Headway was a lifeboat off our lonely island of hopelessness. Our lives were changed irreversibly when Owen was diagnosed. But so, too, were they when NYU Neurosurgeon Dr. Jefrey Wisoff said he thought he could remove the tumor. And when the incredibly kind staff at Hassenfeld and Making Headway walked us through the resources at our disposal post-surgery. And when “Snowen” met Looney Lenny for the first time after surgery. And when we went to our first Family Fun Day on Father’s Day, 2009. And when we snapped a picture of Owen with Dr. Wisoff as he celebrated 10 years cancer-free.

We’re honored to be a part of the Making Headway community—a family of fighters, survivors, and angels. I’m not sure we would have made it off the island if not for them. “Thank you” seems inadequate to the task of expressing our gratitude.